Month: April 2019

Fostering Focus

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Today’s meditation was 10 minutes and 26 seconds, and focused on… well, fostering focus. That’s not really what they called it, but essentially that’s what it was and it fits in perfectly with today’s card.

Today’s card is the Queen of Swords. The suit of swords represents a theme of logic, thought, communication, or challenges. Queens represent a feminine alpha energy, personality, or person.

I feel that the appearance of this card today is telling me that I need to check in on myself and my thoughts throughout the day and make sure that I am staying focused. She is saying that I need to cut down on those meandering stray thoughts that distract me away from my goals and the things that I need to attend to.

She also indicates that when I catch myself wandering off focus to be gentle with myself. Don’t be harsh and judging in my self talk, but instead be kind but firm in bringing myself back on task.

Trying a Different Tact

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OK, so first I’m going to explain what I want to change or… rather, try. And then I’ll do today’s post at the end.

I wasn’t really connecting very well with the affirmations that I was getting from the app that I was using. So I decided to try using my tarot cards instead.

All cards in a deck have general meanings, but can be interpreted in many different ways. So what I want to do is is use the cards to find the positive meaning to my day. One card, one positive interpretation.

Since each card in a deck can have multiple interpretations, even if I get the same card more than once, the interpretation may be different for each time.

I think if I do this I may connect more to the meditation and the affirmations, and then on the days when I just don’t feel up to it and want to “cheat” and do the short path (or want to save time), I can use the app generated affirmations as fill-ins for those days.

Today’s card is the Four of Cups. Cups is the suit of emotions and creativity, and the four represents a theme of ease, shelter, and stability.

When I look at this card I see the water and her floating within it, and today it puts me at ease like when I drown for you and I’m floating in that space.

I think this card is reminding me today that I need to relax, and not try so hard in my meditation. Just let it come. Just relax into it and stop judging myself so hard for every little stray thought that wanders in during the meditation.

I have been dealing with a bit of anxiety so far in my morning. Because of this, I also feel that the card’s appearance is telling me that during my day today I should take a moment now and then just to relax and take a breath and put myself at ease.

Today’s meditation was 10 minutes and 28 seconds, and seem to go a bit easier than the last couple of days.

Meandering Invasions

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I’m starting to wonder if these affirmations are going to do it for me. I might need to find a different source, as this is now the second one in a row (actually the third, cuz I skipped one yesterday that I didn’t like) that I don’t really feel like I connect with.

That said, I did today’s meditation in Calm, which was ten minutes and seven seconds long. My mind kept… I’m not sure if it was wandering so much as meandering into an almost dream-state where a dream would start, and then I’d realize what was happening and bring myself back to the meditation.

The dream-state thing might not of been too bad thing in my meditation… if it wasn’t that every time I slipped that way it messed up my breathing and I ended up feeling like I was holding my breath.

I seem to be having a bit of that anxiety issue this morning. Some tightness in my stomach and my nerves. Discovering that I’d slipped into that weird dream state, and the need for air coming out of it, doesn’t seem to have helped that issue.

Meditation and Affirmations

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Suddenly, I’m not sure what to write here. It’s odd because I know there is a purpose to this activity, and yet now I’m speechless and my head is a blank.

That’s pretty sad, right?

I did the meditation. Today’s guided meditation (I’m using an app called Calm) was 10 minutes and 10 seconds. It wasn’t bad, although I had a difficult time staying focused. That’s with the meditation being on the breath, which is usually something I excel at.

The Joy of MDEs

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I went to the shrink today.   I have been dealing with a pretty deep depression over the past… month?  Month and a half?

I don’t really remember March at all, or most of April thus far.

She has encouraged me to talk to Gideon about monitoring my emotions so that next time I fall into the hole of a Major Depressive Episode, we can try upping my meds briefly to pull me back out.  I’m not sure if it’ll work or make things worse, but if I’m already in an MDE anyway, I figure that it’s worth a try.    There is the risk that the med fluxuation could stir up suicidal thoughts and urges, but if we don’t at least try it, we won’t know.

She also wants me to do a daily meditation in the morning, complete with positive affirmation that I am to meditate on, then try to keep in mind throughout the rest of the day.    I’ve never done affirmations before, so… that will be something new and different.

I suck at “daily” type stuff and getting that kind of stuff to “stick” into my routine, but I’m going to give it a try.

It’s too late to up my meds this time around, as I’m already crawling out of the MDE’s black hole, but maybe with a plan in place, my next one won’t end up stealing 4-6 weeks from me with no memory and (apparently) everything non-essential put on pause during that time.